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Re: Many ad SDKs share locations

From "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid>
Newsgroups comp.mobile.android
Subject Re: Many ad SDKs share locations
Date 2026-09-01 19:12 +0200
Organization Tebibyte_Retro_Gaming
Message-ID <6kdjmmxbq2.ln2@Telcontar.valinor> (permalink)
References (19 earlier) <nflut1Ftup8U1@mid.individual.net> <117667p$1leom$2@dont-email.me> <nfo9b8Fapn0U1@mid.individual.net> <2k9jmmxmop.ln2@Telcontar.valinor> <nfodv8Fbel0U1@mid.individual.net>

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On 2026-09-01 18:49, Andy Burns wrote:
> Carlos E.R. wrote:
> 
>> Andy Burns wrote:
>>
>>> What miniscule proportion of Android users do you think ever attempt 
>>> to install apps from other than the google or manufacturer's app store?
>>
>> I do, some times. I have things from F-droid.
> Well yes, so do I, but people here aren't exactly typical android users.


There are enough users that Google tries to stop them.


I am lazy enough to not do my own research, so I asked ChatGPT:

Q: Do you have an estimate of how many people use applications from F-droid?

Yes—but only approximately. F-Droid deliberately does not collect 
user/installation telemetry, so there isn't an authoritative “X million 
people use F-Droid” figure. F-Droid itself explicitly says it cannot 
accurately report its number of users.
F
F-Droid
+1

The best current clues are:

Over 18 million app downloads and updates in 2025. F-Droid reported this 
at the end of 2025, and notes that the figure is itself extrapolated 
because of its privacy-preserving infrastructure.
F
F-Droid
F-Droid's infrastructure sees millions of APK requests per month. An 
analysis of its May 2025 metrics, for example, found roughly 2.14 
million APK hits per month per front-end server, before accounting for 
mirrors.
F
F-Droid Forum
There are also many mirrors and third-party F-Droid-compatible 
clients/repositories, so F-Droid's own servers don't capture the whole 
ecosystem. F-Droid explicitly warns that server metrics therefore can't 
be converted straightforwardly into users.
F
F-Droid
For scale, the main F-Droid repository had 4,061 apps at the end of 2025.
F
F-Droid
My rough estimate

If by “people who use applications from F-Droid” you mean people who 
actively obtain/update apps through the F-Droid ecosystem, I'd put the 
order of magnitude at roughly:

~1–3 million active users worldwide, with perhaps several million if you 
count occasional/inactive users.

I would not regard that as a measured statistic—it's an inference from 
download activity, server metrics, and the fact that substantial 
activity happens through mirrors and alternative clients. The true 
number could plausibly be outside that range.

One useful sanity check is the 18 million annual downloads/updates: 
that's about 1.5 million per month. If an active user averages, say, 
5–15 F-Droid downloads/updates per month, that implies roughly 
100,000–300,000 highly active users on that particular metric alone. But 
because downloads are unevenly distributed, users update automatically, 
and the 18M figure has privacy-related estimation/mirror complications, 
it shouldn't be treated as a direct user count.

If you're asking because you're considering how large the potential 
audience is for an app distributed through F-Droid, I can give you a 
more useful estimate of monthly active F-Droid users, installs per app, 
and what percentage of Android users that represents, including 
historical trends.

F
F
Sources

-- 
Cheers, Carlos.
ES🇪🇸, EU🇪🇺;

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Thread

Many ad SDKs share locations ram@zedat.fu-berlin.de (Stefan Ram) - 2026-08-05 21:06 +0000
  Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-08-05 13:56 -0800
    Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-08-05 15:17 -0800
  Re: Many ad SDKs share locations "R.Wieser" <address@is.invalid> - 2026-08-06 09:16 +0200
    Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-08-06 07:55 -0800
  Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Arno Welzel <usenet@arnowelzel.de> - 2026-08-07 16:09 +0200
    Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-08-07 18:51 -0800
      Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Arno Welzel <usenet@arnowelzel.de> - 2026-08-09 11:18 +0200
        Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-08-15 09:05 -0800
          Re: Many ad SDKs share locations "Carlos E. R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> - 2026-08-15 19:30 +0200
            Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-08-15 10:37 -0800
          Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Nuno Silva <nunojsilva@invalid.invalid> - 2026-08-16 09:28 +0100
            Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-08-16 10:26 -0800
              Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Arno Welzel <usenet@arnowelzel.de> - 2026-08-18 12:54 +0200
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations "Carlos E. R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> - 2026-08-18 12:58 +0200
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-08-18 09:08 -0800
          Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Arno Welzel <usenet@arnowelzel.de> - 2026-08-18 12:48 +0200
            Re: Many ad SDKs share locations "Carlos E. R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> - 2026-08-18 13:00 +0200
              Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-08-18 10:37 -0800
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations AJL <noemail@none.com> - 2026-08-19 03:55 +0000
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-08-18 23:00 -0800
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations AJL <noemail@none.com> - 2026-08-19 16:31 +0000
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-08-20 06:21 -0800
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations AJL <noemail@none.com> - 2026-08-20 15:17 +0000
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-08-20 08:44 -0800
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations AJL <noemail@none.com> - 2026-08-20 18:07 +0000
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-08-20 22:46 -0800
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations AJL <noemail@none.com> - 2026-08-21 17:20 +0000
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-08-22 11:04 -0800
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations AJL <noemail@none.com> - 2026-08-22 21:43 +0000
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-08-23 07:25 -0800
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Frank Slootweg <this@ddress.is.invalid> - 2026-08-20 18:30 +0000
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations AJL <noemail@none.com> - 2026-08-20 20:20 +0000
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-08-20 22:45 -0800
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations AJL <noemail@none.com> - 2026-08-21 16:51 +0000
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-08-22 10:29 -0800
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations AJL <noemail@none.com> - 2026-08-22 20:30 +0000
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-08-23 07:30 -0800
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations AJL <noemail@none.com> - 2026-08-23 16:39 +0000
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-08-23 09:05 -0800
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations AJL <noemail@none.com> - 2026-08-23 18:18 +0000
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-08-24 19:04 +0200
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations AJL <noemail@none.com> - 2026-08-24 10:53 -0700
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-08-24 20:42 +0200
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations lisa <not.in.use@home.invalid> - 2026-08-23 20:40 +0200
                [OT] US news sources (was: Re: Many ad SDKs share locations) Nuno Silva <nunojsilva@invalid.invalid> - 2026-08-25 12:47 +0100
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Andy Burns <usenet@andyburns.uk> - 2026-08-31 17:29 +0100
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-08-31 12:07 -0600
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Andy Burns <usenet@andyburns.uk> - 2026-08-31 19:20 +0100
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-08-31 19:15 -0600
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Nuno Silva <nunojsilva@invalid.invalid> - 2026-09-01 10:34 +0100
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Andy Burns <usenet@andyburns.uk> - 2026-09-01 16:30 +0100
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> - 2026-09-01 18:03 +0200
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Andy Burns <usenet@andyburns.uk> - 2026-09-01 17:49 +0100
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> - 2026-09-01 19:12 +0200
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Andy Burns <usenet@andyburns.uk> - 2026-09-01 18:40 +0100
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> - 2026-09-01 20:05 +0200
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-09-01 21:44 +0200
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Arno Welzel <usenet@arnowelzel.de> - 2026-09-02 10:11 +0200
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Arno Welzel <usenet@arnowelzel.de> - 2026-09-02 10:08 +0200
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Frank Slootweg <this@ddress.is.invalid> - 2026-08-21 07:51 +0000
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations AJL <noemail@none.com> - 2026-08-21 17:41 +0000
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Nuno Silva <nunojsilva@invalid.invalid> - 2026-08-21 00:40 +0100
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-08-20 22:43 -0800
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Frank Slootweg <this@ddress.is.invalid> - 2026-08-21 07:59 +0000
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-08-22 11:08 -0800
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-08-20 22:45 -0800
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Arno Welzel <usenet@arnowelzel.de> - 2026-08-20 22:58 +0200
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Maria Sophia <mariasophia@comprehension.com> - 2026-08-20 22:43 -0800
                Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Arno Welzel <usenet@arnowelzel.de> - 2026-08-29 17:21 +0200
            Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Nuno Silva <nunojsilva@invalid.invalid> - 2026-08-21 00:23 +0100
              Re: Many ad SDKs share locations Arno Welzel <usenet@arnowelzel.de> - 2026-08-29 17:23 +0200

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